Becomes second IPL player after Nitish Rana to test positive after entering biobubble in Mumbai
Axar Patel, the SUV from Delhi Capitals, has tested positive for Covid-19. Patel had checked into the team’s hotel in Mumbai on March 28 after arriving with a negative Covid-19 report, but has since tested positive.
He is currently “in isolation in a designated health care facility.” The franchise’s medical team “is in constant contact with Axar and ensuring their safety and well-being”. The Capitals are currently training at the facilities of the Cricket Club of India (Brabourne Stadium), and the club has prohibited its members from accessing the areas used by the franchise.
Patel was with the India team – Tests and T20Is against England – until recently, and had a remarkable start to his Test career in the absence of Ravindra Jadeja. He played three of the four rounds in the series and collected 27 wickets, mostly jointly with Dilip Doshi (against Australia in 1979) for the majority of an Indian’s wickets in his first round of rounds. He also played the first T20I of the five-game series, on March 12, the last time he was in action.
He is the second cricketer, after Nitish Rana of the Kolkata Knight Riders, to test positive since teams began checking in at their hotels in Mumbai and Chennai. However, there was positive news for Rana, as the Knight Riders posted a video showing him attending a team training session after an extended 12-day quarantine.
“I first took the test because it is mandatory to enter Mumbai, so I did it and got a negative result. Then I flew to Mumbai and came directly to the hotel. The day I came, I did my usual workouts inside the room,” said Rana in the video. “In Mumbai, after the first day (day 2) of quarantine, I was retested. I didn’t have any symptoms. It wasn’t like I felt different for three days or so.
“Obviously I wasn’t expecting the tests to come back positive. I had taken all kinds of precautions. But despite that, I contracted Covid. The protocols I had to follow, the BCCI guidelines, or the things my doctors had told me to do. do, I followed each and every one.
“On the eleventh day (of quarantine), I was retested and got a negative report. [Friday] I retested myself and came back negative. “
BCCI’s “IPL 2021: Health and Safety Protocols” manual sets out the rules and regulations for dealing with Covid-19 cases in detail.
- Suspicious / positive cases will be immediately isolated from the rest of the team.
- The team physician will inform the BCCI medical director immediately.
- The local health authority will be notified immediately of the positive result of the RT-PCR test.
- The case will be handled in close coordination with accredited hospitals and treatment centers equipped with Covid-19 treatment and testing equipment.
- All cases in question will be handled according to the guidelines established by the government applicable to that particular area.
- Contact tracing should begin immediately. All persons who have been in close contact with the case during the previous 48 hours from the moment of collection of the sample that resulted in a positive test will be isolated and tested. All casual contacts in the last 48 hours from the time of collection of the sample that resulted in a positive test, will also be isolated and analyzed immediately.
- All personnel handling positive cases must compulsorily wear full PPE equipment (goggles, face shield, N95 mask, gloves, overalls / gown, head cover and shoe covers) while handling a suspected / positive case of Covid-19 .
Apart from this, in the case of asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic individuals, the protocol is for the person to be isolated in a designated area outside of the biosecure environment for a minimum of ten days from the day the sample that gave rise to the Positive report was taken.
As such, the situation in Mumbai, as well as other parts of the country, is quite grim, with a new spike in Covid-19 cases, which Maharashtra’s chief minister (of which Mumbai is a part) Uddhav Thakeray has called a “Second wave”. Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Kolkata and Ahmedabad are the six host centers for the 2021 IPL, which will begin on April 9, with Hyderabad identified as a contingency option should one or more of the six designated cities fail to can host matches.
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